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The AMPTP just made this announcement. Talks begin tomorrow and I’m told this news reflects significant “progress.” Indeed, DGA President Michael Apted told members in a letter today “We would not enter negotiations with the AMPTP unless we were within shouting distance of an agreement on our two most important issues: jurisdiction for our members to work in new media and appropriate compensation for the reuse of our work on the Internet and other new media platforms.” But Apted also noted: “There are still hurdles to jump.”
As a top insider in the negotiations just emailed me, “The process is fully functioning, and both sides are engaged with a keen eye on what’s good for everyone (other guild members, community, etc).”It’s common knowledge that the Directors Guild, whose contract expires in June, doesn’t start formal negotiations until most of the big issues are ironed out ahead of time in months of early pre-sessions. 
And that’s what happened over the past two weeks, including a secret meeting between News Corp No. 2 Peter Chernin and Walt Disney President Bob Iger about Internet issues with reps for the Directors Guild, including negotiations committee chair Gil Cates and executive director Jay Roth. (See my previous, EXCLUSIVE: DGA Met With Moguls Today.) Even hardliners among the moguls like Warner Bros boss Barry Meyer are widely known to be “very eager” to get a DGA deal quickly in order to lord it over the striking WGA. The big question still remains whether the deal which the DGA can reach with the studios and networks will be acceptable to the Writers Guild so the current scribe strike can end and possibly prevent a Screen Actors Guild come June:
LOS ANGELES – The Directors Guild of America and the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers agreed today to enter into formal contract
negotiations. Negotiations are scheduled to begin tomorrow, Saturday, January 12, 2008, and will be held at AMPTP headquarters in Encino, CA. The DGA and the AMPTP have agreed that neither organization will comment to the press regarding negotiations until negotiations have concluded.
Here is DGA President Michael Apted’s letter about it to members:
I am writing to inform you that with the unanimous agreement of the Negotiations Committee and the recommendation of Negotiations Chairman Gil Cates, I have authorized the start of formal negotiations with the AMPTP and we will begin our first negotiations session tomorrow.
As I have stated before, we would not enter negotiations with the AMPTP unless we were within shouting distance of an agreement on our two most important issues: jurisdiction for our members to work in new media and appropriate compensation for the reuse of our work on the Internet and other new media platforms.
We’ve spent the last few months discussing these and related issues with the studios and we’ve been doing intensive research on these points for the past year and a half. Now we believe it is time to move forward with the goal to hammer out an agreement. I am very mindful of how many members are unemployed and believe that our reaching a deal will bring the industry closer to getting back to work.
There are still hurdles to jump. However, we would not be going forward unless we believed we could make a good deal.
As is our practice, once we enter negotiations tomorrow, there will be a total news blackout on the talks. As soon as there is anything definitive to report we will be in touch with the membership.
Sincerely,
Michael Apted
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When all the people raging against the WGA do their fussing, I keep wondering if they’re blindly overlooking the fact that the AMPTP is refusing to come back to the table with the WGA.
REFUSING.
I’m not saying that the guild hasn’t made a single misstep in this process, but seriously. If their negotiating partner won’t even show up, how is that the guild’s fault? What are they supposed to do, people?
This complaint brought to you by the number of people about to start whining about why the DGA is negotiating and the WGA refuses to.
Hope the DGA has more luck with that press blackout than the WGA had.
I say good. If the DGA can get a good deal, that’ll help the writers, if not, it’ll show that it’s not the guilds who are the problem.
The DGA has tremendous leverage right now. If they play their cards right, they can settle WGA and SAG contracts at the same.
And the WGA is putting on a Union solidarity film festival while the DGA negotiates. Great. As a feature writer, I’m feeling less and less like this is my strike.
good or bad news? i am so turned around at this point.
Good news, imo. DGA knows that they have to make a “good” deal. AMPTP is looking to make a quick deal with the DGA and embarrass the writers so they can say “See how difficult they are! We made a deal with the director 5 months before their contract’s up!” So hopefully it’ll go reasonably quickly, and the rumors are true that the moderate writers are going to get the WGA to take it.
I hope the DA takes a deal that isn’t to our liking. It’s time to end pattern bargaining once and for all.
Well, I hope they know this…
“At the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas this week, NBC Universal’s president of Integrated Media Beth Comstock said she expects her company to hit $1 billion in digital revenue by the end of this year.”
We do.
Nikki hit the nail on the head when she said “The big question still remains whether the deal which the DGA can reach with the studios and networks will be acceptable to the Writers Guild”.
I could care less what the DGA does at this point. I don’t want to extend my hate mail much further, but my attitude is after the way the AMPTP has “negotiated” with us, I don’t give a flying fuck what contract the DGA signs, if it isn’t EXACTLY what the WGA wants (which is only slightly different from what I want), I hope we stay out until the deal is perfect.
Yeah, I’m that pissed.
This could go two ways.
If they’re smart the AMPTP would use these negotiations to make the WGA look unreasonable.
But this is the AMPTP we’re talking about here.
The smart thing isn’t normally their thing.
Most likely they’ll make the DGA the same crappy offer they made the WGA, then walk away when the DGA looks for something better.
I guess we won’t see DGA picketers playing chicken with SUVs.
Almost broke, I certainly hear you — I’m a feature writer as well. But this does affect us just as much as our brothers and sisters in TV. As someone said above, it’s not that the WGA is without failure – there certainly has been some, but the other side isn’t even showing up to the table. I personally feel that the guild could do a lot more to rally public and government support and intervention. Stuff like “singles day,” “take your kids to picket day,” and the film festival aren’t exactly pro-active maneuvers in my opinion, but whatever faults the guild has, this is still our fight too.
The WGA talks broke down over the ridiculous jurisdictional issues the guild insisted on raising. Even if the DGA’s deal on new media is palatable to the WGA, the jurisdiction issues remain the stumbling block. Only when the WGA gives up on these will a deal be reached.
Yeah this is GREAT news for the rest of us held hostage by the strike! The DGA must have something good up their sleeves to agree to start – good for ALL OF US.
TRANSPO
wow, starting on a Saturday. Sounds like the real deal.
Thank goodness the competent negotiators are now arriving at the table! No name calling, no posturing, no grandstanding, no skits or silly videos — just professionals who realize what should have been obvious to the WGA leadership — we are all in this business together. I hope for a swift and fair outcome — one that both SAG and the WGA can get behind.
“Save us Obi-Apted. You’re our only hope.”
I’LL TAKE IT!
Oops. I mean… I look forward to the DGA making a deal that can possibly be a framework for further WGA-AMPTP negotiations, but of course, the WGA should only agree to a contract that is fair and reasonable, and makes sense for writers.
The WGA strike has scared the hell out of the moguls. they want a way out without it looking like the strike took its toll. They want to pretend they were always ready to make a reasonable deal, and that the WGA (and any other striking union in the future) is roadkill. This is their chance.
And Gil Cates, and the DGA, who blew VHS/DVDs for all three guilds twenty years ago, get their chance to make good.
All the AMPTP has to do is offer something like 100 to 200 times the 250 dollar offer they left on the table when they walked away two months ago, and we’re all good to go back to work.
Until then, we stay on the line. And you shills keep shilling.
WGA East on the line
I think the WGA got themselves into a much better position by getting those agreements in place with WWP, UA, and the Weinsteins before the DGA talks even started. If they hadn’t, I think they would have been pretty much forced to accept whatever deal the DGA made no matter how bad it was. But here they have proof that their terms are reasonable and some of the people in charge are willing to live with them.
Does anyone else think when all is said and done, we’re going to end up with the writers working off a bunch of separate interim agreements, with no full AMPTP agreement ever to come? And does anyone else think that might not be a bad thing?
Glad to see the AMPTP’s stooges are still hard at work on this site spreading misinformation, fear & outright lies.
Everyone hopes that the DGA gets a good deal on internet. Everyone. But just because the DGA’s two requirements are met (internet residuals & internet coverage), that doesn’t mean they’ll be met at a rate that the WGA considers fair, nor does it address any of the WGA’s other outstanding issues, such as the DVD residual formula, coverage of animation and reality writers, product integration (i.e. paid commercials inserted into scripts which the writers aren’t paid a percentage of, nor paid to extra to disguise this advertising as script), upping pay rates on Basic Cable, upping The CW to the status of the other networks, upping the residual rates on made-for-pay-television to at least what the DGA currently has, and more.
The DGA has their items, the WGA has their own. We can build off of their contract, but if they settle for a lousy deal, we’re going to refuse to go along with them… the AMPTP needs to hear & understand this quite clearly.
I said it a month ago, I’ll say it again:
The writers’ strike will give the DGA the leverage it needs to make a decent deal. Because of the strike it will be a better deal than they would’ve gotten.
Then the WGA will take the same deal. The AMPTP will blame Patric Verrone, saying he could’ve had this deal in November if he hadn’t been such a hot head. Patric Verrone will not care, since he will have done his job and gotten the writers more then THEY HAVE EVER BEEN OFFERED.
Both the DGA and AMPTP need it to go this way.
The DGA can’t risk taking a deal that the writers will then reject. It would break pattern bargaining, and if the WGA eventually gets a better deal it will lower the status of directors — the thing they hate most.
The DGA knows this. That is why there has been unprecedented cooperation between the DGA and the WGA — sharing information, etc. It is also why the DGA is their recent letter refers to “reaching a deal will bring the industry closer to getting back to work.” They know they can’t take one that will be turned down by the other unions. They will make sure the WGA (and SAG) are on board before reccomendingany deal to their members.
The AMPTP needs it work because if another union goes on strike, suddenly the WGA is not as crazy as they’ve been saying. A DGA strike will also kill any film production based on existing scripts as well as some reality shows. Not much will remain.
So, let’s hope the DGA and the AMPTP go through the motions quickly.
How bout that ‘President of the WGA East, who sent a letter to members calling the AMPTP liars’
as opposed to a clever man, Apted, who has a news blackout…to avoid such idiocy as Winetrippers.
and Apted was talking for months before negotiating the final details. well how bout, that, knowing what your sitting down for? Ain’t that clever? Or is blind sheep walking into slaughter a better way?
The Weegie’s Management are bumblers alright, but who cares, Tina Fey’s gonna be at the next rally….the cause is not only ignorant, looks souless, but ya’ll fired the first shot, you went to war, kinda like Bush, when it was entirely unnecessary. War is for ego, negotiating for peace. To be complianing about the AMPTP now is silly, cuz you started the war.
Did anyone forget what the AMPTP did was illegal! They can’t just forget about the negotiations. They can’t just walk away. That is not in good faith.